Weekly Report - 26 January 2023 (WR-23-04)

Argentina’s President Alberto Fernández played host to regional leaders for the summit of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (Celac) on 24 January.... Read More

Deputies from left-wing parties in Peru’s congress presented an impeachment motion against President Dina Boluarte for permanent moral incapacity on 25 January over the high level of fatalities in the protests that followed her assumption of power on 7 December.... Read More

Grassroots opposition groups across Bolivia staged a nationwide ‘cabildo’ on 25 January, holding mass public gatherings to decide whether to resume anti-government protests which were suspended a week earlier.... Read More

President Gustavo Petro’s government held crisis talks with the Ejército de Liberación Nacional (ELN) guerrilla group from 17-21 January to smooth over a new year’s gaffe in which Petro prematurely announced that the group had agreed to a ceasefire [WR-23-01].... Read More

Two weeks after rioters stormed Brazil’s congress, presidential palace, and supreme court (STF) headquarters in Brasília, on 8 January, President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva of the left-wing Partido dos Trabalhadores (PT) has been engaged in a major effort to tighten his grip on the country’s security forces which are still packed with supporters of right-wing former president Jair Bolsonaro (2019-2023).... Read More

President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva accused his predecessor Jair Bolsonaro (2019-2023) of promoting “genocide” this week after the dissemination of images of severely malnourished indigenous Yanomami children and adults.... Read More

Chile’s political opposition savaged the government led by President Gabriel Boric this week, accusing it of “extreme amateurism” that was jeopardising the country’s standing on the international stage.... Read More

Mexico’s three main opposition parties are standing united in their fight against President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s attempts to reform the electoral system.... Read More

The first witnesses have testified in the trial of Mexico’s former public security minister Genaro García Luna (2006-2012), which began in earnest on 23 January in New York.... Read More

The arrest of Adolfo Marenco, a former director of Nicaragua’s national police (PNN) investigations and intelligence and (now former) member of the inner circle of First Lady Rosario Murillo, has made headlines given the apparent rarity of instances of the government led by President Daniel Ortega turning on its allies while continuing to carry out a crackdown on its opponents.... Read More

United Nations (UN) Secretary General António Guterres has been among those to condemn the recent killings in Honduras of two environmental activists, Jairo Bonilla and Aly Domínguez, who were part of the Guapinol community, Tocoa municipality, Colón department.... Read More

Ecuador’s President Guillermo Lasso returned at the weekend from a trip to Davos, Switzerland, for the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum (WEF), to a particularly ill-timed corruption scandal [WR-23-03] just days before regional and municipal elections on 5 February, and a referendum on constitutional reforms promoted by his government.... Read More

“There is a certain sector of the Latin American right that thinks that violence is an acceptable way to combat democracy and threaten society.... Read More